Corrientes GRAND SLAM | 22 - 26 mai 2013

Press release

Alison & Emanuel plan 2013 World Tour debut in Corrientes

Alison and Emanuel and are all revved up to play in the Corrientes Grand Slam after missing out on the first two event of the season in Fuzhou and Shanghai due to Alison's injured little finger

Saquarema, Brazil, May 16, 2013 - The 2011 World Tour champions Alison Cerutti and Emanuel Rego are counting the days to their 2013 debut when they will take part in the Corrientes Grand Slam in Argentina, scheduled from May 21 to 26.

The pair did not take part in the Fuzhou Open in China or the Grand Slam in Shanghai at the beginning of the season owing to Alison’s injured little finger.

They have nevertheless been hard at work preparing for the Grand Slam at the Volleyball Development Centre in Saquarema with other athletes in the Brazilian national beach volleyball programme. Brazil’s heat wave has made their training sessions all the more intense but this has done nothing to dampen Alison and Emanuel’s excitement and confidence. They are still extremely focused and have admitted that it was difficult not to have played in the season’s opening tournaments.

"For me, I would have gone ahead and played in Shanghai. But on the advice of Emanuel and the entire coaching staff I was forced to stay calm. Injuries are part of any athlete’s career but it is also important to keep a level head and do what is right. My injury possibly came at the right moment and now we are even more motivated to represent Brazil well at the Grand Slam in Argentina,” said Alison.

Emanuel is currently the World Tour record holder having won a total of ten times. He has played with five different partners including Zé Marco (1996/1997), Loyola (1999), Tande (2001), Ricardo (2003-2007) and Alison (2011).

For Emanuel “focus” is the key word. "I will confess that we were prepared to go to Brasilia for the last leg of the 2012/2013 Circuit Bank of Brazil as well as for the first two events in China. Unfortunately, this accident happened with Alison, which set back out plans a little. But now is the time to make our debut and while we have had a less stressful time to date, we have still been very focused and motivated during our training sessions,” said Emanuel.

Aside from Alison and Emanuel, the other teams representing Brazil in the Corrientes Grand Slam are Bruno Schmidt/Peter Solberg, Ricardo/Alvaro Filho and Evandro/Vitor Felipe.

Maria Elisa/Agatha, Taiana/Talita, Lili/Barbara Seixas and Maria Clara/Carol will be representing Brazil at the Grand Slam in Corrientes. Following Larissa França’s retirement from professional beach volleyball, her former partner Juliana Felisberta has already begun training with the national team in Aryzão.

Juliana is the current World Tour champion and record holder in the tournament, with seven victories that she took with former partner Larissa from 2005 to 2007 and then 2009 to 2012. Juliana has been working with coach Marcos Miranda in preparation for her debut in the 2013 season and is also entered to compete at the Grand Slam in The Hague this June. Juliana – bronze medalist in the 2012 London Olympics – is scheduled to play with Maria Elisa, her partner since Larissa left the sands at the tournament in The Netherlands.